HARRIET AND THE PIPER VOLUME XI

CHAPTER I


Richard Carter had called the place "Crownlands," not to please
himself, or even his wife. But it was to his mother's newly born
family pride that the idea of being the Carters of Crownlands made
its appeal. The estate, when he bought it, had belonged to a
Carter, and the tradition was that two hundred years before it had
been a grant of the first George to the first of the name in
America. Madame Carter, as the old lady liked to be called,
immediately adopted the unknown owner into a vague cousinship,
spoke of him as "a kinsman of ours," and proceeded to tell old
friends that Crownlands had always been "in the family."

It was a home hardly deserving of the pretentious name, although
it was beautiful enough, and spacious enough, for notice, even
among the magnificent neighbours that surrounded it. It was of
creamy brick, colonial in design, and set in splendid lawns and
great trees on the bank of the blue Hudson. White driveways
circled it, great stables and garages across a curve of green
meadows had their own invisible domain, and on the shining highway
there was a full mile of high brick fence, a marching line of
great maples and sycamores, and a demure lodge beside the mighty
iron gates.

Much of this was as Richard Carter had found it five years ago,
but about the house, inside and out, his wife had made changes,
had lent the place something of her own individuality and charm.
It was Isabelle Carter who had visualized the window-boxes and the
awnings, the walks where emerald grass spouted between the bricks,
the terrace with its fat balustrade and shallow marble steps
descending to the river. Great stone jars, spilling the brilliant
scarlet of geraniums, flanked the steps, and the shadows of the
mighty trees fell clear and sharp across the marble. And on a soft
June afternoon, sitting in the silence and the fragrance with
boats plying up and down the river, and birds twittering and
flashing at the brim of the fountain, one might have dreamed one's
self in some forgotten Italian garden rather than a short two
hours' trip away from the busiest and most congested city of the
world.